On Thin Ice
by NinjaMonkeyGirl2013
Summary: "Jamie, I'm scared!" Sophie cried out for her brother. History was repeating itself and the only thing Jack could do was watch. Two-shot.
1. Chapter 1

**NMG: Oh god, what have I done?**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Rise of the Guardians**

**NMG: Just . . . read. That's all I can say right now.**

* * *

It was just an ordinary day in Burgess, school was out for winter break, and Jack Frost sat in his favorite tree at the lake waiting for his best friend and first believer: Jamie Bennett.

Only now, Jamie wasn't a little boy anymore, now he was fourteen and a freshman in high school. But even though this was the point in time Jamie probably should stop believing in the Guardians, he still believed. His friends thought he was being silly or childish, but Jamie didn't care. He knew they were real because one of his best friends was a Guardian.

Jack waited for Jamie and the now seven year old Sophie to come because it was the day Jamie was going to teach Sophie how to ice skate. Jack, of course, wanted to keep an eye out for them to make sure nothing bad happened. Jamie thought he was being silly, but after what happened three hundred years ago, Jack didn't want to take any chances.

Soon enough, the Bennett children had arrived with ice skates in hand. Jack jumped down the tree to greet them.

"Hey, guys," Jack greeted.

"Hey, Jack," Jamie returned.

"Hi Jackie!" Sophie called, using her nickname for him. Jack chuckled and ruffled Sophie's already messy hair.

"Alright, I triple layered the lake so that it doesn't break, but since it's sunny it probably melted a little, so I'll be up in that tree over there watching to make sure nothing happens," Jack explained.

"Got it. Geez, Jack, you sound like a mother hen," Jamie joked.

"Ha, ha, very funny. But seriously, if you aren't careful then you could get hurt."

"We'll be fine, Jack. Thanks."

With that, the Bennetts put on their skates and Jamie began teaching Sophie how to ice skate. Jack sat in the tree branch watching carefully. For a moment, he saw himself teaching his own little sister how to ice skate just like that time three hundred years ago. But this time, he made sure nothing bad happened.

Jamie helped Sophie balance herself and from there, taught her how to skate around the entire lake.

"You're doing great, Sophie!" Jamie commented.

She giggled and looked to Jack and called, "Are you gonna skate too?"

"Nah, I'll just watch. But Jamie's right, you're doing pretty good so far," Jack called out.

"You think so?"

"Yeah, I do."

Sophie giggled again and continued skating with her older brother. After about a half an hour, Jack was positive it was safe and drifted into sleep.

A blood curdling scream let out that woke Jack from his peaceful slumber. The winter spirit got his staff ready for danger, but then he looked down at the lake. What he saw both terrified him and broke his heart at the same time.

Sophie was standing on thin, cracking ice and Jamie was at the edge, trying to calm her down.

"Sophie, its okay," Jamie comforted. He took off his ice skates and crept slowly over to Sophie. "I'm right here."

"Jamie, I'm scared!" Sophie cried, tears streaming down her eyes out of the pure fear that the ice may crack and she could fall into the freezing water.

At that moment, Jack froze. He couldn't bring himself to do anything, his mind flashed back to the moment he saw his own sister in the exact same position Sophie was in right now.

"_Jack, I'm scared!_" she said.

"_Don't look down! Don't look down, just look at me. You're gonna be fine. You're not gonna fall in. In fact . . . we're gonna have a little fun instead,_" he said in an attempt to calm her down.

"_No we're not!_"

"_Would I trick you?_" He gave a forced grin to try to keep her calm.

"_Yes! You always play tricks!_" At that point, his sister's eyes were brimming with tears.

"_Well, not this time. I promise, I promise. You're going to be fine. You just . . . you just have to believe in me._"

And now, history was repeating itself before his very eyes and he couldn't find the strength to do anything about it. His mind and heart were screaming at him to move and help, but his body wouldn't obey.

"I know, I know," Jamie said in a soothing voice as he continued walking towards her.

He took a couple more steps and accidentally made the ice crack. Both Jamie and Jack flinched at the crack, but Jamie kept going, trying to keep Sophie from freaking out.

"Your gonna be okay. Just don't look down, look at me. I'm not gonna let you fall in. I promise. When have I ever broken promise?" Jamie asked.

Sophie sniffed, but managed to reply in between her sobs, "Never."

"Exactly. Now wipe those tears because I'm not gonna let you fall. In fact, we're gonna have a little fun instead," Jamie said, quoting Jack from when they were up against Pitch.

"How?"

"We're gonna play a game. You just need to believe in me. Like you believe in Jack."

Sophie choked on a sob and nodded.

"Good girl. We're gonna play a new game. We're gonna play pretend. We're gonna pretend that you're the damsel in distress and I'm your knight in shining armor!" Jamie said.

Even with the situation at hand, Sophie found the energy inside her to laugh a little.

"I'll be right back, I'm just getting something that'll help us with the game. Just keep looking at me," Jamie comforted.

He backed up, not taking his eyes off of Sophie. Once he got to the edge, he grabbed a branch that had broken off a tree and walked back to Sophie.

"Okay, now grab onto this," Jamie said. "Pretend it's a rope that your climbing to get out of the tower your evil stepmother trapped you in."

Nervously, Sophie took the edge of the branch.

"That's it. Now I'm going to count to three, just hold on tightly and when I get to three, I'm gonna throw you to the edge, like I'd throw you away from a fire-breathing dragon. Okay?"

She nodded and gripped the branch as tightly as she could.

"One."

Sweat began beading on Jamie's forehead, worry filled up his chest that he may be too late.

"Two."

He shoved that aside. He faced the Boogeyman when he was eleven for crying out loud! If he could do that, then he could save his sister.

"Three!"

Jamie threw Sophie to the thicker, safer ice. She landed on her butt, which was slightly painful, the young girl was very grateful that she wasn't in the icy cold water of the lake. She looked up at her older brother and the two shared a smile. A smile of warmth and love and faith in each other.

But it broke when in a gunshot sound let out and the ice cracked completely.

"JAMIE!" Sophie cried.

Jack snapped out of his trance and flew into action. Jack flew into the water and grabbed Jamie before he could completely submerge into the lake and flew the young adolescent to shore. Jamie coughed up the water he had accidentally swallowed as Jack rubbed the young boy's back.

"Are you okay?" Jack asked.

Jamie coughed again and responded, "I'll live."

Sophie threw off her skates and ran to Jamie and tackled him, tears pouring down her face.

"What's up, Sophie?" Jamie asked.

"I thought you were going to die, Jamie!" Sophie cried into his soaking wet shirt.

"I'd never leave you like that, I promise."

He hugged her and they stayed that way for a good ten minutes until Sophie cried herself to sleep.

"I'm so sorry, Jamie," Jack said after a moment of silence.

Jamie looked up at his good friend and said, "Why are you apologizing?"

"I should have done something. I just stood there and did nothing . . ."

"Hey, it's okay. You saved me when you could, better late than never." Jack opened his mouth to retort, but Jamie stopped him, "Look, you did what you did and it's better than nothing. I'm just grateful Sophie's alive at the very least."

Jack smiled at Jamie's selflessness. Even after all that, Jamie still believed in his friend.

"I should take Sophie home with me. Thanks for everything, Jack," Jamie said.

"No problem, Jamie," Jack replied.

_And thank you, Jamie. For believing in me._

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**NMG: Kind of a corny ending, but the more tragic, angsty one is coming up tomorrow. I have no idea where this idea came from, but it's been bugging me for some time that I just had to write it down. So here's my attempt at a one-shot. Hope you liked it and don't forget to REVIEW!**


	2. Alternate Ending

**A/N: So here's the ALTERNATE angsty ending. Have your tissues ready, people.**

**Disclaimer: See the last chapter.**

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"JAMIE!" Sophie cried.

Jack was about to spring into action, but he found his feet were tied down with black sand. He did his best to move and even froze the sand, but that only made it worse. A low chuckle went through the air that made Jack's blood run cold.

"_You see, you can't kill fear, Jack,_" the familiar cold voice said.

Jack managed to slam his staff on the frozen sand and broke free. With that, he dove into the water and pulled out Jamie's unconscious body from the icy cold water. But he wasn't breathing. Jack looked up to Sophie.

"Sophie, go get help, please," Jack said. Sophie nodded stiffly and threw off her skates and ran off, tears still streaming in her eyes.

Jack put an ear onto Jamie's chest and could hear the faint _thump, thump, thump_ of his heartbeat. He didn't know any CPR, had no way of contacting the other Guardians, and didn't know what to do. All Jack could do was sit there and wait for Sophie to get help.

"Damn it," the winter spirit muttered to himself. He felt so useless. He wanted to do something, but it's not like anyone could hear him except for the kids and they probably wouldn't understand the severity of the situation.

Eventually, Sophie did come back with her mom and dad and the paramedics. They picked up Jamie and put him on a stretcher and rolled him into the ambulance with the Bennett family following and drove off to the hospital. Jack followed the ambulance to the wretched place and watched as they rolled Jamie out and into the building. Jamie's mom and dad sat in the waiting room and his mom held Sophie in her arms as she cried silent tears.

Jack on the other hand was pacing back and forth. After Sophie calmed down, she watched Jack as he tried to convince himself that Jamie would be okay.

Jack drowned in the lake, but that was three hundred years ago, no one knew how to save a person who fell into freezing cold waters and the technology to save them was nonexistent at the time. But this was modern day, 2012, so Jack figured they could save him.

They had to.

The sun had already set and it was already dark when the doctor came out. Relief washed over Jack when he saw the doctor.

"Well? How is he?" Jack and Jamie's father asked in unison. Even though Jack knew no one could hear him, he had to ask the question.

Unfortunately, the answer wasn't the one Jack was expecting. Or hoping he wasn't going to get.

"I'm very sorry, Mr. and Mrs. Bennett, but your son has passed on," the doctor said.

Jamie's mother burst into tears and Sophie was crying just as much as her mother was. Jamie's father sat down, his head buried in his hands, and cried silently.

Jack on the other hand took the news the worst out of all of them.

"No, no that can't be true. You're playing a sick joke right?" Jack asked the doctor, but he didn't answer. Out of sadness and frustration, Jack yelled at the doctor again, "He can't die!"

"Jack . . ." Sophie whispered into her mother's shirt.

"Jamie can't die! H-he can't . . ."

But the doctor's grim look and the sympathetic look in his eyes was all Jack needed to know that what the doctor said was true. In a fury, Jack flew out of the hospital, his feet barely touching the ground as he did. He flew back to the lake and into the trees and didn't come down, even when the blizzard ravaged through Burgess.

* * *

At the North Pole, North heard about the storms at Burgess and called forth his fellow Guardians.

"What's going on, North?" Bunnymund asked.

"Blizzards are raging in Burgess," the Russian man replied.

"Something happened with Jack," Tooth translated.

"So what are we going to do?" the Australian bunny asked. Sandy made a few images appear over his head, showing he had an idea. "We go down there to talk to Jack?"

"Brilliant!" North said.

"No, it's not. He's probably being a big baby again."

"Bunny! He could seriously be hurting right now," Tooth said, defending Jack.

"I doubt it, this is Jack Frost we're talking about here."

"Either way, we're going down there. Everyone to the sleigh!" North said. Bunny groaned in response, but followed the others. They flew down to the lake in Burgess to be blinded by the snow.

"Crikey! What the hell is goin' on?!" Bunny cried.

"We're about to find out!" North replied. He landed the sleigh and they went through the forest.

"Jack! Jack, where are you?" Tooth called.

"Oi! Frostbite! Where are you?! Stop it with the blizzards already!" Bunnymund called. Eventually Bunny saw a head of white hair sitting in a tree and he called for the others. They ran to Jack and climbed the tree.

Tooth was the first to speak, "Jack, what's going on? Why are you doing this?"

"It's my fault. It's my fault he's dead," Jack muttered.

The four of them shared a glance and Bunny asked, "Who's dead, mate?"

"Jamie . . ."

The Guardians gasped at this. They couldn't believe the young boy was dead. Jack's first believer and his best friend, it seemed impossible that Jamie could die at such a young age. Jack wouldn't allow that.

"Mate . . ." Bunny said.

"It's my fault. I-I let the ice crack, I didn't . . . I didn't do anything, it's all my fault," Jack muttered.

"Jack, it's not your fault," Tooth said. Before Jack could respond though, the fairy hugged him. All the other Guardians joined in the group hug as the blizzard died down into nothing.

* * *

The funeral was a quiet one. Sophie explained to her parents that Jamie didn't die in vain and that he died in place of her. If it wasn't for him, she wouldn't be alive.

As the people listen to the priest, Jack was standing in the farthest corner of the church and watched the whole thing. It was painful for Jack to watch them carry out Jamie's body in the casket, but he braved through it. He wanted to give Jamie his respects. The other Guardians came too. Only Sophie could see them all, though.

Later, they took his coffin to the cemetery and lowered the fourteen year old into the Earth. Once they all left, the Guardians each bestowed a gift onto the grave.

North left a small snow globe with a boy sledding, Bunny put an egg he specially painted with Jamie's image, Tooth put Jamie's tooth box in between the two gifts, and Sandy left a single glass ball with golden sand that shifted with different images of the Guardians.

Jack was the final one and he left a small ice sculpture with all five Guardians holding Jamie up. "Goodbye, Jamie. And thank you for everything," Jack said.

With that, the Guardians left the cemetery, but they never forgot their good friend and believer.

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**A/N: Now let me make this very clear: no, this does not mean Pitch is back. Fear will always exist, but it's not strong enough to bring back Pitch in this story. It also does not mean I will make a sequel, this is simply the alternate ending.**

**Now that that's done *starts crying* WHY AM I SO CRUEL?!**

**I won't blame you all if you started yelling at me for doing this TT^TT**


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